1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to information processing apparatuses capable of communicating with printing devices and to methods and programs of controlling the information processing apparatuses.
2. Description of the Related Art
Network systems in which a plurality of printing devices are connected to a plurality of host computers via a network and in which each of the plurality of printing devices can perform printing in accordance with printing instructions from the plurality of host computers have been available.
In such systems, when a user sends a printing instruction from a host computer so that printing processing is performed, the user first needs to choose a desired printing device from among a plurality of printing devices. Here, various selection criteria are possible. For example, a printing device having desired functions, such as a color printing function and a two-sided printing function, may be selected. Alternatively, a printing device located in a place nearest to the user may be selected. Technologies for searching for a printing device that satisfies various conditions desired by a user from among a plurality of printing devices on a network and for providing the found printing device to the user are known.
In many cases, printers that have been selected by a user are registered as so-called “favorites” and are used repeatedly. Also, printing settings for actual printing, such as the paper size, the resolution, color printing, and two-sided printing, are often set in the same way every time printing is performed. Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 9-188007 describes a technology in which printing settings are registered for each of a plurality of printing devices registered in a host computer. A user definition name corresponding to a printing device is selected such that the printing device used as an output destination and printing settings for the selected printing device can be set at the same time. Accordingly, the user does not need to set printing settings every time a printing device used as an output destination is selected.
For the known technologies, printing settings and an output destination can be stored in association with each other. However, when a user inputs desired search conditions, a printing device that satisfies the conditions are searched for, and printing processing is performed using the found printing device, printing settings must be set before the printing processing is performed.
In other words, in order to search for a desired printing device, the user needs to input functions of the printing device as search conditions. Also, the user needs to set the desired functions again as printing settings for the found printing device. Thus, the number of operations required for the user increases.